Man, welcome to the way research (and lots of administrations) works: if you have a budget, YOU GOTTSA SPEND IT before fiscal year end. Otherwise the bean-counters up above might get it into their heads that you didn’t need so much money to begin with and lower your budget for the following year.

It’s just good timing for me, really.

And very unfortunately, I can’t even really ask for two separate machines (otherwise a combo 17″ + MacAir would have been tempting)… So, sorry: you’ll have to pester your own boss to convince him that a new macbook is necessary to your work.